The Queen's Lender

It’s rare that I have such an immediate response to, and impression made by, a work of fiction but occasionally a novel comes along which is that pleasurable you almost feel compelled to return immediately to the first page and begin again. That is the minimum level of praise that The Queen’s Lender warrants; in all honesty, it deserves a great deal more. If this novel does not win a major award in the next publishing cycle, it will be a travesty and a disservice to the talents and intelligence of the author. I’m effusive and unashamed in writing such a review.

Meet George Heriot, the Queen’s Lender. Based in Edinburgh, Heriot is a goldsmith by trade, royal-appointed jeweller and subsequently a philanthropist. A detail which the author brings to attention is that the role of the goldsmith in the seventeenth century was not just to produce jewels and precious metals but also to fulfil a number of other financial services to the monarch, thus Heriot becomes the Queen’s Banker. Mr Heriot holds the ear of the Queen as well as the purse strings, and both provide him with sufficient information and strategic knowledge to ensure that his fortune is made, yet despite this he serves dutifully and ably. Discretion sits well with debt in this case and whilst Heriot is depicted as a loyal servant, the reader is in no way deluded that Heriot’s main priority is the preservation of himself and his family. 

Heriot ascends the ranks of the court, initially selling items to Anne of Denmark (Queen Consort) before his appointment to serve the Queen. Anne’s reputation for her love of jewellery is portrayed well, as is the lavish spending which was undertaken by her and James VI. What is significant about this portrayal of Heriot is the manner in which it illustrates how his philanthropic activity and considerations were borne out of concerns about the spendthrift and extravagant nature of the monarchy’s activities. He hears: ‘the Masque of Blackness … cost over £100,000 – enough to build a palace, or to educate the whole of Edinburgh.’ It is at this point Findlay is able to offer Heriot’s counterpoint to the significant wealth he accrues and benefits from due to such expenditure. 

Findlay is able to depict the tales of each critical member of the ruling family and their critical roles in the formation of the United Kingdom with a tenderness and humanity that is often markedly juxtaposed against the violence and brutality which characterised the court of James VI of Scotland. The young boy subjected to a brutal glossectomy for praying with a rosary is a harrowing but tender scene that sticks long in the memory.  

Anne’s lack of financial acumen, James’s paranoia about witchcraft and his subsequent purging of East Lothian, the appointment of the grandiloquent Shakespeare as Court Playwright and the broader commentary on the relationship between Europe and the United Kingdom gives this novel a timely resonance on the principles that history doesn’t repeat itself, it simply rhymes. As Ben Jonson is heard to say: ‘We English need separation, independence, none of your wet alliances with Spain … England has never liked Europe … We do not need them, we can fight the world alone.’ From the need to move away from one’s home in order to prosper to the political division and nepotism which dominates, this astute piece of fiction is both in and out of its time.  

The elegance of Findlay’s documenting this figure is enhanced by the laser-focused attention to his troubled private life as a father and husband who was often bereft of his wife and children by circumstances beyond his control, including death in childbirth and a childless marriage. At the point of Union and James I’s decision to move to London, we see Heriot’s concern as to the consequence of his wife’s travelling to London. This is a sequence where Findlay’s ability to bring the subject of her fiction to life, a touching and humane set of exchanges where the dialogue and scene-setting is delightful. She excels in conveying the environment and interrelationship between that and the emotions experienced by the characters, whether the reader is in the privacy of the Queen’s own chamber, a pungent fishmonger within the lively atmosphere of an Edinburgh street, an aromatic garden, or a claustrophobic and unsettled cabin in a ship sailing at the mercies of sea.

There is much more that could be said about The Queen’s Lender but this will hopefully sufficiently whet the appetite for the sumptuous feast of fiction that lies ahead for curious readers. Mr Heriot’s legacy has lived on through Heriot’s Hospital, George Heriot’s School and Heriot-Watt University. I expect that reputation to be burnished by this marvellous account of his life and the circumstances in which he lived.

 

 

-- Martyn Colebrook * 'The Queen's Lender' by Jean Findlay *

In The Queen’s Lender Jean Findlay gives us a wonderful insight into life in 17^th century Edinburgh and London, and in particular the extravagant, intrigue-ridden, courts of James Stuart and his Danish consort, Anna.The story begins in 1593, when both the King’s and George Heriot’s wives are pregnant.  Queen Anna, who is just 17 years old, loves jewels, and James – desperate for an heir – is ready to indulge her every whim, so Heriot is a frequent visitor to the palace. He and his own wife, Christian, live above his workshop in Fishmarket Close.“It is past midnight and the Royal Mile is brisk with life. Shouts and laughter, the hum of warm and ribald talk in the tavern next door. A slice of fiddle music each time the door opens…Fishmarket Close, a smelly wynd but narrow and steep so the bones and guts from the fish shops will sluice downhill in the rain.”

Findlay excels in conveying the nature of a place, be it the Queen’s own private chamber, an Edinburgh close, a fragrant garden, or a claustrophobic cabin in a ship at sea. We are there, we smell the flowers and the fish, we see the vomit. Heriot’s life will run in parallel with Anna’s; for he is not only an acclaimed jeweller, who loves precious stones for their beauty rather than their acquisition, but also a canny man of business. Through all the ups, and the many downs, of his working life he will keep meticulous accounts, and he is shrewd in his dealings with the court. No sooner has he made a new piece for Anna or James than every courtier wants one; fashion is all. At the palace clothes and jewellery convey not only rank and status; they send messages. Everything is symbolic. Ambitious courtiers compete to assert their importance;  Heriot charges them in advance, and far more than he charges the King. His wealth increases. Anna gives his rings as gifts to visiting ambassadors; his work is seen all over Europe.

Anna, meanwhile, has no idea about money, so Heriot lends it to her. It comes back to him as payment for his work, and he still owns the debt, carefully recorded in his ledgers. He becomes, in fact, her private banker. George may bear physical similarities to Anna’s James:

“But (he is) a much gentler version, and one that listens.“

And there is one more glaring difference: Heriot balances his books, while the King and Queen spend with reckless abandon, which in the end cannot fail to lead to trouble.

These are violent times and the King is permanently suspicious (as well he might be, given the fate of his mother, Mary Queen of Scots) and, especially after visiting his in-laws in Denmark, obsessed with the dangers of witchcraft. He sends ‘witch hunters’ out into East Lothian to track down these wicked females. He orders witch trials and tortures, and interrogates the accused women himself. He even writes a book about it, Daemonologie (which later provides material for Macbeth.) Later, at masques in London, armed guards protect him. He and his courtiers speak in riddles, never quite meaning what they say. When, on James’ accession to the English throne, the Scottish court (and the Heriots) move to London, William Shakespeare becomes Court Playwright, and we are made even more aware of the fashion – and the need – for elliptical,  oblique, dialogue.  This is the way business is done, and life is led, at court.“All is seen. All is known. They are all being watched.“Most of the characters in this story are real, from the King himself to Shakespeare, Ben Jonson and Inigo Jones. A few have been invented for the good of the story, but so well imagined are they that they are every bit as convincing as the names with which we are familiar. Chief among them is Lady Marjorie Boswell, top rank manipulator and George’s wife’s sister-in-law. He handles her with extreme caution and keeps Christian away from her:“A queen bee must not only succeed herself, she must arrange that other women fall.”

But perhaps Lady Marjorie is simply doing what she can with the hand she’s been dealt; she reminds me a little of Becky Sharp. For when Findlay looks at the position of women in the 17^th century, very little of it is good. Queen Anna may live a privileged life, but in return she must churn out potential heirs at a rate of knots – for many will not survive. She has no privacy, even in childbirth – instead the room is full of courtiers (to make sure the baby is not a ‘switchling’) who sit around eating, drinking and chatting while she endures her labour. For them it is theatre. For Anna, it is agony. She thinks of the ‘witches’ she saw tortured and burned in her native Elsinore. Many women die in childbirth, many infants are stillborn or die in infancy. Midwives and other women who help women are frequently accused of witchcraft – Anna dreads this happening to her own midwife.

And even if mother and child survive, a queen’s babies are not her own. They are immediately dispatched into the care of others. Anna’s Henry is sent to the Earl of Mar at Stirling Castle, partly for his education, partly for his protection. These are dangerous times.

Politics, and especially political relations between European countries, must be considered, and improved, at all times to avoid war (James is all for peace) and protect trade. But, as is said over four centuries later, it’s complicated. Spain wants an allegiance with Scotland to put James on the English throne, and marry Prince Henry – James’s heir – off to a Spanish princess. But Spain is a Catholic country, and James has renounced his Catholic faith, partly to impress Elizabeth I, though he treads a fine line, and loathes Puritans. (Anna is less keen to give up the faith she was born to; James receives constant complaints about this, with the courtiers even saying that Anna’s favourite gentlewoman must be a Catholic ‘because her brother is a poet’…) Catholics are persecuted; an horrific incident on a journey from Edinburgh to to London illustrates all too well what vicious cruelty such persecution can take. In an effort at appeasement (for he sees himself as a version of Solomon, and takes his Divine Right to rule very seriously) James commissions his own translation of the Bible; needless to say, more arguments ensue.

In the taverns, Ben Jonson hears talk that may ring more than a few modern bells:

‘We English need separation, independence, none of your wet alliances with Spain….England has never liked Europe….We do not need them, we can fight the world alone.’

When the court moves to London, relations between James and the English courtiers are not always smooth. They mistrust him and struggle with his Scots dialect; they automatically assume that England is more important and powerful than Scotland. Anna’s name must be changed to Anne. James, in turn, packs Ben Jonson off to walk to Scotland, and insists on having porridge for breakfast.

As the court’s extravagance reaches new heights, Heriot – who profits greatly from the King and Queen’s excess – begins to question this flagrant waste; there are, he knows, much better uses to which money could be put;

“Heriot hears that…the Masque of Blackness..cost over £100,000 – enough to build a palace, or to educate the whole of Edinburgh.”

The seed of an idea is sown. And as Heriot’s eventful life draws to a close, he makes the plans that will lead to the foundation of a school and also a hospital:

“The main school will be called a hospital to cure the faitherless bairns as well as teach them. They cannot learn if they are sick.”

The Queen’s Lender may be set in the 1600s, but its themes still resonate today. It is about power, suspicion, religious strife, persecution and conspiracy, but it is above all a very human story, one of love, loss, suffering and endurance, and of a thoroughly good man, the benefits of whose philanthropy are still felt in 21st century Edinburgh. In the words of the King’s Fool:

“Curtain rise, and curtain fall, but the story goes on, and nothing finishes.

A most enjoyable book, fast-paced, informative, gripping and beautifully written, The Queen’s Lender by Jean Findlay will be published by Scotland Street Press on 14 February 2022.

  -- Rosemary Kaye * The Edinburgh Review *

Jean Findlay’s The Queen’s Lender is a novel set in history, but fortunately for the lover of fiction, the book doesn’t read like a historical text. In fact, events unfold themselves in the most effortless way—as if the reader is witnessing a play instead of reading silent words. Findlay’s characters are serious, like King James; extravagant, like Queen Anne; loyal and generous, like the protagonist George Heriot; cunning and calculating, like Lady Marjorie; and quite often also funny, like The Fool. In other words, these characters are the real deal, and Lady Marjorie seems so authentic that readers will be surprised to find out she’s, in fact, Findlay’s invention, but only in the sense that it’s more probable for individuals with Marjorie’s temperament to have existed at court, rather than not; in this way, she is real, meaning the novel reads like good fiction should—it’s measured yet assertive, intellectually stimulating yet entertaining, and best of all funny without being grotesquely comical.

From the very beginning, readers find themselves engrossed in the world of George Heriot: He’s Queen Anna’s favorite jewel maker, and in time becomes not only her confidante, but also the royal family’s money lender—hence the title of the book. Although readers will benefit from acquainting themselves beforehand with Elizabethan and Jacobean England, the novel can certainly be read without a minor historical background. Through her use of plot, dialogue, setting, and description, Findlay is able to situate the reader—and this v